Cloverfield: The Return of the Monster Movie

It seems that in movies these days, giant monsters are a taboo. Not since the incredibly bad Godzilla 2000 has there been a film about a gargantuan monstrosity smashing every building within its reach. Cloverfield, which opened Friday, finally brought this genre back to the big screen in a fresh new way.

This film was like a mix between Godzilla and The Blair Witch Project. It is shot with a handheld camera and has very few cuts, in order to make it look like a home video. It chronicles the story of some survivors of an attack on New York by a massive monster, which emerges suddenly out of nowhere and begins to lay waste to the city.

The special effects in this movie are incredible. The monster looks very realistic and scary, as do the little dinosaur-spider creatures that drop from it periodically. The buildings actually look like they are falling down, and shoot debris in all directions just as they would in real life. The multiple explosions also look very good.

The biggest problem with the movie is also one of its biggest assets. The shaky camera sets this film apart from other special-effect-fests, making it look more realistic, and putting you in the place of the people in the film, instead of giving you a feeling that you are looking in on the action. The problem with this, however, is that the shakiness can cause a massive headache, which can ruin the movie-watching experience. Make sure to take some Motrin before you go to see this movie.

Another problem with this film is the insertion of a love story that really has no business being there. One of the main characters slept with his best friend a few weeks before the attack, and the day after their night of passion is recorded on the same tape as the monster attack, as if it is being taped over. This means that every once in a while, the action and tension of the monster attack is cut momentarily to show the lovely couple having fun on Staten Island. It destroys the consistency of the movie, as well as destroying the illusion of realism that the film creates.

Although it had its share of problems, this film was good in the long run. It brought back a type of movie that had all but disappeared from theaters, and did it in a new way that brought an interesting facet to the old genre.

The Cougar gives Cloverfiled 3.5/5 stars

2 Responses

1. 5:45 PM on January 26th, 2008=]:

   interesting

2. 2:48 PM on January 28th, 2008Mac Zilber:

   this movie sucked the plot was stupid.

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